More accessibility in Maps - Text on Photo Translated Automatically

[ErmesT]

This evening I had an incredible surprise, which I want to share with the whole community 🙂

A further step forward for the accessibility program, but also for people who want to travel to another country and want to explore a place in Maps, e.g. to see a restaurant menu.

It can be difficult if the menu is in another language and is "in a photo"

From today this may no longer be a problem, because the translation can be done directly in Google Maps in Android.

Yes, you got it right, the text "in a photo" can be translated directly "from Google Maps"

All this thanks to the integration with Google Lens

And from Google Maps you can directly open Google Translator, and listen the text, if you are visually impaired.

The integration with Google Photo has been going on for a long time, and therefore the arrival of Google Lens was certainly expected by many (I was talking about it yesterday with a friend), but to discover that it is already real was a huge surprise.

Today I visited a beautiful park near Treviso. An important place, the place of the last Italian battle of the First World War (I will write a post soon). I entered through the farthest gate, and at the entrance there was a sign with the rules to follow. Since no one usually adds these useful signs to Maps, I thought I'd do it myself.
When I checked the photos I had added, I couldn't believe it. Google Maps asked me (my phone is set in English) if I wanted to translate the sign. Of course I said yes, and here is the result

Caption: a sign in Italian Language (left) translated in English (right) by Google Maps - photos @ermest

Here below the complete screenshots, so you can see how it works

Caption: a sign at the entrance to a park, in Italian. Below you can see the Google Lens symbol with the indication "translate"

Caption: Title: a sign at the entrance to a park, in Italian, with the English translation superimposed. Below are the commands to open the translation in Google Translate

Have you already seen this function?

If not, and you want to test your device, here is the link to the photo: https://goo.gl/maps/zxstZw2Lh4KtAhrj7

EDIT: for some reason the link doesn't work on Mobile. However, here is the photo (embedded from Maps)

If yes, please share your screenshot, I am curious to see with how many languages it works

Today for me is a great day, a huge step forward for the integration.

Have a nice day

Ermes

[PaulPavlinovich]

Wow that's pretty good. I'll definitely find that handy 😸

In the past I've taken screenshots then asked lens to translate but this is great.

Thanks for showing us @ErmesT 

[LaloPadilla]

Great @ErmesT , thanks for sharing this useful tip! It's nice when there is a combination of Google products and it works seamlessly

This will come in handy when traveling abroad and dont make anything illegal haha. I have tried too and I found something really odd, at least in my photos it is only available when there is a large text, not signs (like yours) or menus, but it works!

Caption: Information board in a museum, spanish on the left , translated to english on the right (LG@LaloPadilla )

[Kinjalchhaya]

Wow excellent news and update thanks @ErmesT for sharing this. Such feature with regional language support would definitely be very useful in domestic travel too.

[JanVanHaver]

Great find @ErmesT . I get an error when trying to open the link to your picture, but when looking around a bit on random POIs I soon discovered that this is indeed a new thing for any picture with a decent amount of text.

Here's a screenshot of another picture from that same POI where the text is translated from Italian to Dutch.

 

[JanVanHaver]

After some testing with the language settings, I have figured out that: although you can now switch the interface language in which you use Maps can now be switched inside the app, the Google Lens integration still uses the language selected as main language in your phone settings, not the Maps language @ErmesT 

[MortenCopenhagen]

Hi @ErmesT

When I tap the link you provided for testing I get the following error message :

Unsupported link

Google Maps can not open this link. 

This is the case whether the app language is set to English or Danish.

Cheers

Morten 

[NareshDarji]

That's really great feature! @ErmesT 

I've just seen this feature on map app after reading your post. 

Thanks for sharing with us. 

[ErmesT]

I was doing the same @PaulPavlinovich , taking screenshots and asking lens to translate.

I think this is a first phase, @LaloPadilla , and I hope it will be improved in accuracy and resolution soon. But it is indeed interesting to have this function integrate directly in Maps

[LuigiZ]

Hi @ErmesT,

this is a very nice discovery, and no I wasn't aware about it. Until now I was translating signs with the camera live but indeed a great integration inside Maps.

Thank you for sharing the finding with us 😊.